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"Attention Citizens: Beware the Zombie Plague. All deceased must be burned within six minutes of death to prevent re-animation."

— Propaganda poster seen on Cadia
Plague Zombies

A horde of Plague Zombies

The Zombie Plague, also called the Curse of Unbelief, is a deadly, Warp-spawned viral infection that is spread by the forces of Chaos, and leads to the creation of hordes of infectious, undead zombies. The Zombie Plague originally threatened billions of people on many Imperial worlds near the Eye of Terror in the Segmentum Obscurus before the 13th Black Crusade, but since the birth of the Great Rift the disease now represents a danger to worlds across the galaxy.

The Zombie Plague is a supernatural Warp-based disease, and as such it does not follow the laws of biology or physics, for it can actually only infect those mortals consumed by despair, who have no hope or faith in their hearts. In the uncaring grind of Imperial life, the vast majority of the populace can be counted amongst that number. The unfortunate victims of this horrendous malady rot from the inside out, coughing themselves to death over a long, painful period. Yet that is merely the beginning of their suffering. Those that fall do not stay dead -- their bodies are reanimated by the uncanny psychic power of the arcane infection, and they lurch after the living, desperate to gnaw upon warm, supple flesh. Even a single bite can transfer the infection to a new host, and so the process begins anew.

The Curse of Unbelief has appeared in the underhives of Necromunda and in Chaos-influenced regions of the Segmentum Obscurus near the Eye of Terror, with documented instances of undead fighting against the servants of the Emperor going all the way back to the final days of the Great Crusade before the Horus Heresy, such as during the Luna Wolves Legion's assault upon the feral moon of the world of Davin.

The first recorded incidence of the Zombie Plague in the 41st Millennium came in 757.M41 on the world of Hydra Minoris. A quarantine was imposed by the Navis Imperialis, trapping 23 billion uninfected people alongside a rising tide of hungry and mindless undead. 

The Zombie Plague is an especially favoured tool of the Death Guard Sorcerers and other Chaos Sorcerers who serve Nurgle, the Chaos God of disease and decay, who are more likely to unleash it than all the other followers of Chaos

In the history of the Imperium, billions have died and been returned to undeath. Worse still, since the opening of the Great Rift after the 13th Black Crusade in the Era Indomitus, the proliferating energies of Chaos across the galaxy have mutated countless strains of the original Zombie Plague. Boasting infection vectors as esoteric as nightmares, groans of misery and the surrender to despair, they have created many new types of Plague Zombie to bedevil the Imperium, of which the most common by far are the leering, moaning Poxwalkers.

Biology

"Throne, don't they ever stop? I must have killed a hundred or more of the damned things. -- You probably keep killing the same one. If you don't destroy the head, they get back up again."

Captains Tarik Torgaddon and Garviel Loken, Sons of Horus Legion, during the Battle of Davin's Moon - Great Crusade
Zombie last stand

A pict-capture of Imperial forces making a dire last stand against a horde of zombies on an infected world.

The Zombie Plague is a supernatural, Chaos-infused infection created through the use of Chaos sorcery blessed by the Plague Lord Nurgle to alter a biological virus. The resulting physical symptoms spread rapidly before Abaddon's 13th Black Crusade and was heralded by the invasion of the Plague Fleets of the Chaos Champion Typhus.

This led to the rise of numerous Plague Zombies on Imperial worlds and also resulted in the formation of a new branch within the Inquisition known as the Ordo Sepulturum which was specifically tasked with dealing with the Zombie Plague and similar Chaos-infused biological threats to Humanity.

The plague was a necrotic microorganism that physically degenerated those it infected, causing their skin and internal organs to rapidly rot until the moment of "death" at which time the Chaos energy within the virus reanimated the victim's corpse as a "zombie" whose only remaining drive was to feed on living flesh and so spread the infection.

Plague Zombies destroyer hive

A schematic of a typical Plague Zombie prepared by the magi biologis of the Adeptus Mechanicus.

The Chaos energy in the Zombie Plague virus allows a small portion of the victim's life essence to be retained by their body even after physical death has occurred. However, every attempt at creating a stable "faith virus" that would allow wounded servants of the Imperium to live on as "good undead" like the Emperor or even allow the Emperor to be reborn in an undead form has led to mutation in the sample.

The zombie victims of the plague are noted to have a psychic connection to each other created by the Chaos energy that exists within the virus and it has also been noted that psykers have the capacity to manipulate the pitiable decaying creatures that are spawned.

A common theory among Inquisitors of the Puritan Thorian philosophical persuasion is that the plague is an offshoot of the technology used to modify the Golden Throne to support the Emperor of Mankind's life functions by the Adeptus Mechanicus ten millennia ago. It may have been created by the Dark Mechanicum Tech-priests that reside within the Eye of Terror with the Chaos Space Marines of the Traitor Legions.

There have been numerous noted similarities between the Zombie Plague's ability to use the power of the Warp to reanimate a victim's corpse and the operation of the Golden Throne, which uses the power of the Warp to keep the Emperor of Mankind's body from completely dying.

Increased study of the plague by Thorian Inquisitors has led them to believe that this research can help them understand the Emperor of Mankind's current state and how He might yet be reborn.

Disease Progression

Plague Zombie Poster 1

An Imperial propaganda poster warning its citizens of the symptoms of the dreaded Zombie Plague.

Once infection has occurred, the Zombie Plague proceeds through four basic symptomatic stages:

  1. The first symptoms of the infection are hard to discern. The skin becomes pallid and sickly-looking. The infected is overwhelmed by nausea and sees spots in front of their eyes. Green-coloured scabs may start to appear all over the body. From this point forward, the victim is highly infectious, and the pathogen can be spread by exposure to an infected individual's bodily fluids, such as blood and saliva.
  2. In the second stage, the victim's skin begins to tighten and harden, causing the veins to stand out. The scalp begins to shed hair as the follicles die and the viridian scabbing spreads more noticeably across the skin as the cellular necrosis accelerates. At this stage of the infection the victim is beyond hope of a cure and becomes dangerous to others as his or her sanity begins to be overwhelmed by uncontrollable, abnormal cravings for healthy flesh.
  3. By the time the plague has progressed to its third stage, its effects are no longer capable of being overlooked. The divine perfection of the God-Emperor created Human face is now marred by sunken cheeks, thin lips, necrotic white skin, rotting teeth and large areas of the epidermis that have decayed into vast swathes of seeping, pus-filled cysts. The cellular necrosis reaches the point that large portions of the body can now effectively be considered dead tissue.
  4. The final stage of the plague is truly horrible. Now essentially a mindless, walking corpse after the termination of all life functions such as cellular metabolism and higher cognitive activities, the victim's advanced necrosis causes extremities to simply fall off, rotting veins bubble under parchment-thin dead skin, and final death through a shot to the head or dismemberment is the only release from the torment. Victims of the disease in this stage, colloquially known as "zombies," often congregate in large numbers as they seek out any lifeform that is not infected with the disease so that they can consume healthy flesh.

Notable Strains

  • Fydae Strain - Fydae Strain Plague Zombies, named for the outbreak of the disease that assaulted the mining settlemernt of Sutter's Rock in the Calixis Sector, first appear to be no more than gaunt, dead-eyed plague victims in soiled and blood-spattered clothing. However, this does little to dim the horror for friends and loved ones wracked with grief. As the outbreaks worsen and the Warp-spawned entities known as the Vile Savants themselves make an appearance, the Fydae Zombies decay at an unnaturally accelerated rate. They turn into horrific rotting husks of putrescent flesh, but are no less active or deadly for it.

Videos

See Also

Sources

  • Dark Heresy: Disciples of the Dark Gods (RPG), pp. 147-150
  • Dark Imperium (Second Edition) (Novel) by Guy Haley, Ch. 12
  • False Gods (Novel) by Graham McNeill, pg. 122
  • Gang War 3, "Hot from the Forges: Mail Order Catalog - Plague Zombies: Zombie Regiment," pp. 31-33
  • Imperial Armour Volume Seven - The Siege of Vraks - Part Three, pg. 142
  • Inquisitor: The Thorians Sourcebook by Gav Thorpe
  • Necromunda: Outlanders Rulebook, pp. 81-82
  • The Redeemer (Graphic Novel) written by Pat Mills and Debbie Gallagher and illustrated by Wayne Reynolds
  • The Thirteenth Black Crusade (Background Book) by Andy Hoare, pp. 12-13
  • Warhammer 40,000: Rulebook (6th Edition), pg. 172
  • Warhammer 40,000: Warlords of the Dark Millennium - Typhus (6th Edition), pp. 10, 28
  • White Dwarf 198 (US), "Scavvies: Background and Tactics - Plague Zombies," & "Zombie Master: Karloth Valois," pp. 55-58
  • White Dwarf 200 (US), "Tales from the Underhive: B-Move Scenario Inspirations - Hive of the Living Dead & I Will Survive"
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